During the Xin Lu Video Bus Tour, the four videos are shown on tour
buses along a specially curated route. The aim of the site-specific tour is
to link issues raised by the videos with local history and communities, thereby
“siting” these videos to where they are shown. “On the road”
performances, informative lectures, guerilla hijacking, delicious food fusions,
and reflective discussions will be incorporated into individual tours based
on consultations with local artists, community activists, cultural historians,
arts organizations, and other collaborators.

Guest
Tour Guides:

Amitis
Motevalli was born in Tehran, Iran and moved to the US in 1977. In 1995
she received a BA from SFSU in Art with a minor in Women’s studies
and in 1998 an MFA from Claremont Graduate University. Her work as an
artist incorporates a combination of near-eastern aesthetic with a western
art education. Motevalli states, “Being an immigrant in the US
shows in my work a duality of culture, both natural and learned. In
all of my work, I create a dialogue that critiques dominant views of
oppressed people and culture in general”.

The
Pocho Research Society (PRS) is a collective of artists, activists
and rasquache historians who reside in Los Angeles. Dedicated to the
systematic investigation of space, memory and displacement, the PRS
understands history as a battleground of the present, a location where
hidden & forgotten selves hijack & disrupt the oppression of
our moment. In Operation
Invisible Monument, the PRS confronts the construction of history
through the public monument. Anonymous members installed mock historic
plaques at different locations. The PRS identified these strategic sites
in an effort to pay homage to historic erasure. By inserting plaques,
the PRS hopes to interrupt historical amnesia, trigger memory and interrogate
the present in order to see the world with fresh eyes rather than the
diesel haze of a media-blurred present. The result, ideally, is a reconstruction
or destruction of the hegemonic worldview responsible for the erection
of the site's original monuments.

Kristina
Wong is a nationally presented solo performer, writer, actor, educator,
culture jammer, and filmmaker. Described by the East Bay Express as
"brutal but hilarious... a woman who takes life's absurdities very
seriously," her body of performance work includes short and full-length
solo performance works, outrageous street theater stunts and pranks,
subversive internet installations, and plays and sketch comedy. In her
irreverently signature style, Wong’s performances, presented both
as announced events along the tour and as guerilla theater at unexpected
moments, will give a vigorous shake to the notions of “cultural
tourism” and “authenticity”, and turn some of these
problematic notions on their heads. For more information, go
to Kristina’s web site.

Lunch
Boxes by Diep Tran of Good Girl Foods
For the Xin Lu Video Bus Tour, Tran has prepared
a specially designed bao (steamed buns) sampler, to be accompanied by Asian soft drinks or bottled water. Click here to see the menu and read about how Tran came up with it.

Persian Ice Cream from Mashti Malone'sIce cream sandwiches by simply one of the best ice cream shops in Los Angeles, in Persian flavors such as rosewater, saffron, lavender, orange blossom...

Participating
Organizations:

The Chinese American Museum is jointly developed and operated by the
Friends of the Chinese American Museum (FCAM) and El Pueblo de Los
Angeles Historical Monument, a department of the City of Los Angeles.
Located at the El Pueblo Plaza in downtown Los Angeles, CAM is housed
in the last surviving structure of the city’s original Chinatown.
CAM’s mission is to foster a deeper understanding and appreciation
of America’s diverse heritage by researching, preserving, and
sharing
the history, rich cultural legacy, and continuing contributions of
Chinese Americans. For more information, please visit www.camla.org.
Open Wednesdays - Saturdays, 10am - 3pm.

Founded in 1970, Visual Communications is the nation’s premier
Asian Pacific American media arts center. The mission of Visual Communications
is to promote intercultural understanding through the creation, presentation,
preservation and support of media works by and about Asian Pacific Americans.
Visual Communications will present the 24th edition of The Los Angeles
Asian Pacific Film Festival May 1 through 8, 2008 at the Directors Guild
of America, Laemmle's Sunset 5 Theatre, and Aratani/Japan America Theatre,
among others. The Film Festival will include the latest new works by
established and emerging Asian American filmmakers and video artists;
Asian international artists; and filmmaker seminars, panel discussions
and symposiums on topics relevant to Asian Pacific cinema. For more
information, please visit http://www.vconline.org/

In the Xin Lu project, Los Angeles-based media artist Ming-Yuen S.
Ma uses the metaphor of nomadism to examine his family history, which branches
out from the former British colony of Hong Kong. He envisions Xin Lu (from
the Chinese phrase xin lu li qing, literally translated as heart—road—
experience— journey) as a conceptual road movie that travels in between
cities and countries as well as language and identities. A major component of
this project is four linked experimental videos. Three of the videos investigate
significant points in a journey: departure (Mother/Land), passage (Movements
East—West), and arrival ([os]). The fourth video, Myth(s)
of Creation, is an examination of the travelogue itself, and acts as an
index to the other pieces. To
find out more about the Xin Lu project, click
here

As part of Visual Communications’ 24th annual Los Angeles Asian
Pacific Film Festival, media artist Ming-Yuen S. Ma and Visual Communications
will present two site-specific video bus tours featuring Ma’s experimental
videos from the Xin Lu project. The two tours, first in a global
site-specific series, will take place on Saturday, May 3rd and Sunday,
May 4th, 2008. In addition to the video screening on-board the 50-seat
tour bus—imagine a screening-room-on-wheels—the audience will
also experience a curated tour route along local geopolitical sites related
to the content of the videos. “On the road” performances,
informative lectures, guerilla hijacking, delicious food fusions, and
reflective discussions will be incorporated into the Los Angeles tour
in collaboration with Amitis Motevalli, Pocho Research Society, Diep Tran,
and Kristina Wong.

Bus will leave from the Directors’ Guild of America (DGA) 7920 Sunset
Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90046. Boarding is at 12:30pm, and the tour
is anticipated to last about 4-5 hours. Tickets for the bus tour are $25.00,
including lunch and beverages. For complete program and ticket information
call Visual Communications at 213-680-4462 x59 beginning April 2008 or
visit the festival
web site.